Cities News Roundup

Administrators in Philadelphia turned to the courts last week
in an effort to end the bitter teachers' strike that today enters its
fourth week. But the threat of a walkout in Boston ended when union
members rejected their leaders' recommendation for a strike.

In Philadelphia, picketing teachers harassed administrators as
special classes opened for high-school seniors and for the severely
handicapped. The schools for seniors opened last Wednesday with 10,400
out of 11,700 seniors showing up, and most of the 400 administrators
and other non-striking personnel were there--under protest--to teach
them. The Philadelphia Association of School Administrators filed suit
last week against the school district, objecting to Superintendent
Michael P. Marcase's order that administrators teach at the
schools.

Since the strike began, a few dozen teachers have been arrested
following scuffles between picketers and administrators trying to enter
schools. "It's getting close to goon tactics out there," said a
spokesman for the school system.

The school district is seeking two legal remedies against the
22,000-member Philadelphia Federation of Teachers: a back-to-work order
and a contempt-of-court citation against the union for blocking school
entrances in violation of a court order. As of last Wednesday, no
decision had been reached in either case, although four union staff
members were cited individually with contempt for blocking school
entrance

In Boston, teachers rejected a strike by 1,404 votes to 836.
Observers there believe the union members feared that Superintent
Robert Spillane would carry out his threat to fire striking teachers.
And, the observers say, Boston teachers did not think a strike would
accomplish their goals (see related story on page 7).

Honors courses won't be among the victims of budget-cutting in
Jefferson Parish, La., where a proposal last week to eliminate the
courses brought protesting high-school students to the district's
headquarters.

Instead, officials of the suburban New Orleans district have
consolidated some honors courses, so that there may be fewer sections
of a course in, for example, advanced history. But with some judicious
schedule-juggling, students will still be able to take the popular
courses.

"No academic subjects will be curtailed," district spokesman Joe M.
Miller said. "We're very happy that by reworking things, we were able
to reinstate the honors courses." The only subject that will be
curtailed significantly, Mr. Miller said, is driver education. But even
that will still be offered at all of the high schools.

The debate on "scientific creationism"--expected to go national this
fall on television and in the courts--continues apace at the local
level.

In Florida's Hillsborough County school district, which voted last
spring to test alternate theories of origins, a recent debate between
an evolutionist and a creationist attracted 1,500 people to an
auditorium designed for 600.

The debate, between Kenneth Miller, assistant professor of biology
at Brown University, and Henry Morris, director of the Institute for
Creation Research, was held in Tampa's Jefferson High School.

The forum was for "public information, not to decide a winner or
loser," said a spokesman for the state education department. The crowd,
however, seemed predisposed to favor one side. "Most of them came in
church buses," the spokesman noted.

The district is setting up a pilot project in three schools this
fall, in which "creation science" will be introduced into the
curriculum.

For the first time, intermediate and junior high schools in New York
City have security guards this year.

And to promote "a friendlier atmosphere," guards this year are
wearing blue blazers and gray slacks instead of the customary
uniforms.

The guards were added to intermediate and junior high schools,
according to city school officials, because half of the 1,673 assaults
in the school system last year occurred in such schools. A new mobile
security team also has been established this year to help combat the
increasing number of serious disciplinary problems in the system, the
nation's largest.

For example, the number of reported cases involving weapons rose to
661 last school year from 457 in 1979-80, said Schools Chancellor Frank
J. Macchiarola.

"A sense of security must precede learning," Mr. Macchiarola said in
announcing the changes.

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